Chapter 245

Chapter 245: Chapter 245

Dulce pushed away the Hellhound then, sitting up. There were blades of grass on his clothes and flower petals in his hair, and when he looked around, he saw Asael and Ruoxi a short distance away.

"Seeing as you all have nothing better to do, let’s go to Marlen." He said, rising to his feet.

His momentary interest in Dewmire had waned, and if it weren’t for his arrangement with the Demons, he would have been long gone from the backwater village.

A moment later, he was stepping into his mother’s favorite tea room - Demons were rather convenient, not a lock of his already tousled hair was even out of place.

His gaze was immediately drawn to his mother’s rose garden, but he barely took them in, distracted by the thick black smoke that clouded the sky. It was coming from the royal castle of Marlen, not even the turrets could be seen, the billowing smoke completely swallowed up the symbol of Alderth royalty.

Dulce watched it with a frigid light in his eyes, walking out of the drawing room to go gather answers.

Amelia Bodwyn was a hallway away, and when she caught sight of Dulce, she hurried over eagerly. "Lord Montesserat! We did not receive word of your arrival."

"It was a spur-of-the-moment decision," Dulce waved a hand, distracted. "What happened to the castle? Why did you not send word of it?"

Amelia curtsied again, "A dangerous witch reduced the castle to rubble, but none of the manors around were impacted, so it seemed like a minor matter."

Dulce forced himself to relax; it was indeed a minor matter, everyone knew better than to cross him directly by going for his home. But the burning castle was quite close to the manor, and for a moment, he had been taken back to the past.

Asael hadn’t left the tea room, staring at the plumes of smoke that darkened the sky ahead of the setting sun. Right after Dulce swept out, he vanished from the room, leaving behind a faint trail of black mist.

Up close, the castle was even more unsightly. Steam rose from the moat that surrounded it, the shattered rubble burning constantly. It hadn’t just been destroyed either, he quickly found.

A few nights ago, there had been a deafening sound that roused most of the occupants of the capital. Then a light so bright it seemed like the end of the world. Everyone in the castle had been obliterated, not even the guards stationed at the outer gates had been spared.

The fire burned mysteriously, refusing to go out. Although it wasn’t like there had been much of an attempt to put it out, the citizens of Marlen were convinced that this was an ominous sign. To have the royal castle of a powerful kingdom such as Alderth be destroyed in a single night by an unknown entity.

There were rumors that the Vampires who were being hunted down relentlessly by the blessed Queen had come to take revenge. To make matters stranger, not a single noble had come to steal the throne or, at the very least, to take the helm of the country now without a leader.

By the time he returned to the manor, Dulce had returned to the tea room. The Vampire sat next to the lattice windows, his distant gaze fixed on the sea of red roses.

"Mildrede destroyed the castle." Asael explained, "Potentially the very night Aylin died."

That snapped Dulce out of the strange mood that the sight of the mountain of smoke had put him in. "Incompetent," He scoffed, looking as if he would like to level all the surrounding buildings so they wouldn’t pose a threat to the manor.

Ruoxi rose to his feet and spun Dulce out of his seat and into his arms. The Incubus had been on the quiet side recently, his lotus mark surprisingly visible still - it was difficult to tell what was truly on his mind behind his mildly amused expression.

"Let’s go down to Ensbury until this all blows over," He suggested smoothly. "It’s about the time for their Spring Festival." He had an arm around Dulce’s waist, his other hand entangled with the Vampire’s. His mask of amusement didn’t crack even though Dulce glared darkly at him.

It was better that Dulce didn’t remain in Marlen while the ominous smoke rose steadily into the sky, but it didn’t mean he was eager to spend time in Ensbury. The last time he had been there was truly the start of all his troubles, not to mention that he didn’t care for flower wine.

Caedos had taken a seat on the armchair next to Dulce, when they arrived in Marlen, the Vampire had the acrid scent of sulphur and terror clinging to him. It was lighter now, but it hardly eased his worry.

The Hellhound’s inscrutable expression didn’t show a ripple even as he stared intently at Dulce. The Vampire was intriguing, but despite being more expressive, he was even more guarded.

Once, the Vampire was a well of soothing emotions; it had drawn Caedos in, but now, his emotional plane was a hellscape. There was however, a vibrancy that no amount of calm could ever compare to.

Even as Dulce glared coldly at Ruoxi, the Vampire’s heart raced, anger mixing with sensual heat.

"Fine." He agreed coolly, turning his head to the side dismissively. It was either the lively city or the dreary cottage, the choice was obvious.

Dulce tensed slightly when the room around them fell away. He had more or less grown used to being warped around constantly within a few days, but the Demons were prone to vanishing from place to place without even the slightest hint of warning.

They arrived in an unsettlingly familiar room, which was fortunately empty. Dulce took a quick look around and immediately distanced himself from the Incubus, sweeping out.

"I’m not staying in this inn another night." He gritted out as he stepped into the hallway, startling a barmaid who was hurrying past with an armful of clean sheets.

Ruoxi had taken them to the very inn they had been forced to spend the night in on their journey to Marlen roughly a year ago. It was just the two of them, but it would only take a matter of moments for the rest of the Demons to find him.

Ruoxi was right behind him, his hands in the pockets of his pants as he sauntered after him. "I never asked you to." He drawled.

The barmaid was even more startled by the sight of Ruoxi, dropping the sheets she held with a look of dazed awe on her ruddy face.

An aristocratic but disheveled man with striking features had been a pleasant surprise, but the towering hunk that appeared after he did was nothing short of godly.

Dulce stewed in his rage, self-conscious. For the first time, he wanted to reach through time and shake his past self hard. He was so distracted that he walked right into Asael, who seemed to appear out of thin air just as he stepped out of the inn.

With a faintly bruised nose, and a very much wounded ego, he took a sharp turn at random, storming off.

Asael watched him go, his eyes dark in the gentle blue of early evening. "What did you do?"

Ruoxi just shrugged, even though his gold-hued lotus mark was unveiled, the Demon still drew awed looks from everyone around. Patrons who were seated in the ground-floor tavern of the inn had even stumbled out to get another look at him, like they had been hypnotized, the street slowing to a halt.

"Where are you going?" He directly asked Dulce next.

The street they were on was very familiar. It was just the start of the festival, and it was already lively, the first of the decorations already going up. It was nowhere near as crowded as it had been the last time they were in the city, but it was certainly only a matter of a few days.

Dulce’s dark red dress shirt was partly untucked, a sliver of his pale chest visible from how many buttons had become undone from his romp in the meadows, and if you looked closely enough, you could still find flower petals in his hair.

"To a brothe- oof!" He was suddenly interrupted by a wall of Demon, his breath knocked out of him.

Kath’tan’s purple eyes seemed to glow with a life of their own, the Fiend’s powerful arm was wrapped tight around his waist, partly to keep him from stumbling and mostly to keep him immobile.

"Why?" He asked, his low voice threaded with danger.

Dulce looked around; the sky was darkening, but the street only got brighter. Pink and blue-painted lanterns had begun to go up, music spilling out into the busy street. The inn they had stayed in last time they visited Ensbury had been a stone’s throw from the red-light district, so he basically was already in the more hedonistic part of the city.

People passed by them, paying little attention to their proximity or the fact that they had both come to a stop in the middle of the path - neither was uncommon in that part of the city.